Trends In Tuition And Technology

(NAPSI)—To help their students get ahead, some schools have gotten a helping
hand.

Currently, as college tuition rises, community colleges are seeing a large
spike in enrollment. More than one in three postsecondary students spend some
time in community colleges.

Community colleges are particularly important for students who are older,
working or need remedial classes. Many of them have no computers or only dated,
obsolete ones that can’t be taken to class, so widely available technology on
campuses is critical to their success. Computer labs and classroom technology
remain an important part of community college service and educational offerings
but campuses often don’t have a lot of money to spend on technology.

Several schools, however, have found an answer. Here are two inspiring
examples:

* With enrollment skyrocketing, Los Angeles Community College District
(LACCD), the largest community college district in the country, had to expand.
Through a $6 billion construction boom, it had to equip an additional building
every month for six months with new technology and do so affordably.

“We had the same problems everyone else is having: demand for more and
higher-quality services over longer periods of time—without commensurate
increases in budgets or staffing,” said Jorge Mata, CIO of the district. “In
addition, we needed to align with the district’s environmental vision.”

They decided to outfit the school with HP thin client computers, devices that
contain enough information to start up and connect to a more powerful network
server that provides the rest of the computing horsepower. This gives students
and faculty a

With community college attendance rising, the need for affordable technology increases as well.

personalized computer environment anywhere in the network, lets
technology staff manage computers remotely and has cut overall technology power
consumption, making the solution a win all around.

* Merced College, in Merced, California, also needed to find a way to
improve technology reliability while cutting costs in order to provide access to
the increasing number of new students without raising tuition.

“The biggest thing is finding ways to purchase what we need to keep our
technology current,” explained Donald Peterson, director of IT. “It’s hard in
any state environment and it’s now harder and harder each year.”

Peterson decided to replace the assorted technology brands that the college
had with HP equipment in a budget-friendly strategy. The equipment
standardization has made it easier for students and teachers to become confident
when using the technology equipment and has provided a stable and reliable
environment for the colleges’ IT staff.